So Sennacherib king of Assyria departed, and went and returned, and dwelt at Nineveh.
Sennacherib ... dwelt in Nineveh - for about 18 or 20 years after his disaster, according to the inscriptions. The 22nd year of his reign has been found on them, and none subsequent. The canon of Ptolemy fixes his accession to 702 BC, and the accession of Esar-haddon to 680 BC - i:e., about 18 years after the second invasion in 698 BC The word "dwelt" is consistent with any indefinite length of time. Nineveh, so called from Ninus - i:e., Nimrod, its founder; his name means exceedingly impious rebel; he subverted the existing patriarchal order of society, by setting up a system of chieftainship founded on conquest: the hunting-field was his training school for war; he was of the race of Ham, and transgressed the limits marked by God (Genesis 10:8-11; Genesis 10:25), encroaching on Shem's potion; he abandoned Babel for a time, after the miraculous confusion of tongues, and went and founded Nineveh; he was, after death, worshipped as Orion the constellation (note, Job 9:9; Job 38:31).